


The Something You Were After

by violentdarlings



Series: Modern Middle Earth [1]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Dwarf/Elf Relationship(s), F/M, I just couldn't bear to kill Kili, M/M, Parent Thranduil, thankfully less angst than the last fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-18
Updated: 2015-01-18
Packaged: 2018-03-08 01:41:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3191045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violentdarlings/pseuds/violentdarlings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thranduil and Tauriel take the long way around.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Something You Were After

Thranduil is waiting at the airport when he meets her. Legolas is flying in for Christmas from Gondor, and Thranduil is waiting for his son to emerge from Arrivals when the redhead drops a suitcase beside him.

“Hello,” she says brightly. Thranduil nods stiffly, shooting a look at her out the corner of his eye, and then making a complete dick of himself by turning to look at her again. The double take is necessary to capture the full extent of the girl’s looks: her fiery hair, green eyes, and the clear purity of her skin.

“Hello,” he replies, feeling far too old for all this nonsense. “Are you waiting?”

The girl flicks her hair out of her face, reaching up to wrestle it into a quick bun. “Much better,” she says to no one in particular. “Actually, I’m here with someone,” she says. “We’re getting picked up.”

What he wants to say is, _would you like to get picked up?_ The girl’s hair is the colour of fire and there is a calm confidence in her gaze that makes him stand a little taller. “Mmm,” he says noncommittally, and the girl nods.

“Yeah. Listen, how about I give you my number, and you can call me later? We could –”

“DAD!” a voice roars, and Thranduil is almost bowled off his feet by his son appearing out of nowhere and flinging his arms around him.

“Legolas,” he replies, keeping his voice steady even as his heart threatens to beat out of his chest. His boy. His beloved boy. Over Legolas’s shoulder, Thranduil watches the girl look between them and put two and two together.

“This is your dad, then?” she asks as Legolas pulls out of his father’s embrace, and Thranduil is helpless in the face of Legolas’s bright grin.

“I knew you two would get along!” he says. “Dad, this is Tauriel. My… girlfriend.” And if there is a trifle of stiffness to his son’s face, or a touch of absentmindedness in the way he grips Tauriel’s hand, then Thranduil is just too blind to notice.

 

 

Tauriel and Legolas share his son’s childhood bedroom and late at night Thranduil hears them talking. He has never been more grateful for his own bedroom being at the opposite end of the hall. Accidently overhearing his son making love would be far more than he could tolerate. Yet there is no such moments of sheer awkwardness, praise be to the Valar.

He can’t tell his son that the girl tried to hit on him. Firstly, he doubts Legolas would believe him and secondly, for all the world seems to disbelieve it, he loves his son. He would not do anything to wipe the brilliant smile of his son’s face, not for all the world. And they seem happy together, despite what he perceives as Tauriel’s wandering eye.

Which is why he gets the shock of his life, when he comes home early from work one afternoon. He’d thought to get started early on cooking dinner, make something nice for his son and his son’s trollop girlfriend. Thranduil has never really known how to be a good father, for all he tries.

To his surprise, his son’s favourite boots are in the front hall, along with a pair of ugly, battered steel caps that mystify him. The house is silent when he calls out his son’s name, and so he heads upstairs to change out of his work clothes and oh dear Ilúvatar.

All he see through his son’s open door is a long, lean body and a shorter, thicker one entwined on the bed. Nevertheless, that is enough to convince him that his son, his perfect, lovely boy, is in bed with another man.

Thranduil takes in breath to speak, and it comes out a roar.

 

 

“Dad,” his son pleads as Thranduil storms downstairs. Legolas is pulling his shirt over his head. “Please. Father. Let me explain.”

“Explain!” Thranduil bellows at him. “Is there any other reason for you being in bed with a man other than _you being in bed with a man?”_

“No,” Legolas admits, eyes downcast. “I’m sorry, Dad. I didn’t want you to know.”

“Then you shouldn’t have down it under my roof,” Thranduil snarls, and Legolas flinches. “If there’s anything I’ve tried to teach you, boy, is to live your life with a little integrity.” Legolas is flushed in comparison to his father’s deathly pale, his hands trembling, but for the first time his anger is eclipsed by his fear.

“Integrity’s got nothing to do with it,” Legolas snaps. “You just don’t want a gay son. Well, Father, if I’m such a burden to you with my unnatural ways, then I’ll just –”

“Do be quiet, boy,” Thranduil says firmly. “Legolas, this has nothing to do with your… _companion_ being a man. It’s got everything to do with you having a partner already. There is no excuse for betraying your girlfriend – or boyfriend, whatever! For Eru’s sake, you’ve been living with Tauriel under my roof for weeks now!”

But Legolas does not seem to be paying attention. Rather, his cheeks are red and his eyes glinting hopefully. “Just to clarify,” Thranduil’s son says in a trembling voice, and Thranduil puts his hands on his hips and appeals to Ilúvatar for patience. “You’re angry because you think I betrayed Tauriel.”

“Yes!” Thranduil replies heatedly. Legolas is smiling.

“You’re not mad about… about Gimli being a guy?” Thranduil glares at his son.

“Of course not! I don’t give a damn whether you like men or not, Legolas – did you say Gimli?” Thranduil snaps, swinging around to eye his son, who is looking everywhere but back at his father. “Not Gimli, Gloin’s lad, the same Gloin that works for Thorin Oakenshield?” He pins his son with the ‘don’t you dare lie to me’ stare he’d perfected when Legolas was in high school.

“Um,” Legolas replies eloquently. “Maybe. Yes?”

“WHAT?”

 

It surprises no one that Tauriel and Legolas don’t return to Gondor after Christmas. They have their stuff shipped to their flat down the street from Thranduil’s house in the little cluster of towns that include Mirkwood, Erebor, and Dale. Nor is it a great shock when Tauriel and Legolas ‘break up’ despite never actually being together. Thranduil attends their flat warming and endures the presence of a multitude of guests from Erebor. Thankfully Thorin Oakenshield is not in attendance, but his two nephews are, and a whole host of other members of that pernicious family, not least young Gimli, some form of distant cousin.

“So what you’re saying is, you were his beard,” says young Fíli, Tauriel at the centre of a cluster of Gimli’s friends. Thranduil eyes them from his seat in the corner of the room, his fingers tight on the stem of his wineglass. Only an hour more and he can safely make his escape, for all his house feels quiet and lonesome without the effervescent presence of his son.

“Quite right,” Tauriel agrees, sipping her drink and smiling. The other nephew, Kíli, elbows his brother aside to sit beside Tauriel on the sofa.

“You’re the prettiest beard I’ve ever seen,” he tells her sweetly, and his brother chortles.

“Not that he would know, since he can’t grow one,” Fíli says to general amusement, but Thranduil notices the way the younger lad uses the diversion to sidle out the door, Tauriel just behind him.

Thranduil finishes his glass and looks about the room for his son. Appearances be damned, he can’t endure anymore of this, especially the way Gimli keeps slipping an arm around Legolas’s waist. His son is practically glowing with happiness, and it is all down to the kin of his enemy. It is more than anyone can be expected to bear.

Thranduil looks out the window and, quite by accident, sees the unusual duo beginning to walk down the street. Tauriel is almost a head taller than the stocky lad, but somehow, when he reaches for her hand, she doesn’t pull away.

 

He sees little and less of his son of late. Tauriel has been accepted into the police academy and Legolas is contentedly working in the local book shop. His boss, a diminutive woman called Bilba, raves about his ability with customers. While Thranduil might have hoped for more for his son, Legolas is incandescently happy, and to endure Gimli around for dinner every Thursday night is a small enough sacrifice for his son’s happiness.

Gimli moves in with Legolas and Tauriel moves in with Fíli and Kíli, and life goes on. Legolas begins a degree in literature in his spare time and Tauriel graduates from the police academy. She is almost immediately snapped up by Mirkwood’s police force, and for a time Thranduil feels as though he is the only static thing left in the world. He goes to work, he comes home, drinks a glass (or four) of wine, gets into bed. Rinse and repeat.

 

Legolas and Gimli get married.

Thranduil supposes it is more appropriately a ‘commitment ceremony’. The reception is at a hall in Dale, apparently a compromise over location. Every member of Gimli’s family (distant or otherwise) is there, and some of Legolas’s friends among the Dúnedain and the men of Gondor: Boromir, Faramir, and of course Aragorn.

“I am sorry your mother cannot be here,” Thranduil had whispered to his son during a quiet moment. “But know this. Your mother loved you. More than anyone. More than life. And… she would have been immensely proud of you.” His son had stared at him with silent incredulity. Thranduil could not recall how long it had been since he had spoken of his wife. Too long, perhaps.

“Thank you, Dad,” Legolas had said with true sincerity, and Thranduil had slipped away quickly, before their feelings got the best of them.

There had been speeches, there had been toasts. Legolas had not asked his father to make a speech, for which Thranduil was truly grateful. Mithrandir had made a speech about love and fealty and several other things; Thranduil had tuned out.

The wine is flowing as the evening melts into true night. Thranduil, at the edge of the room, feels neither part of things nor set apart from them. He sees Bilba Baggins waltzing with Thorin Oakenshield, who for once isn’t scowling; Legolas and Gimli being nauseatingly adorable, and Kíli Durin looking miserable and scowling. The last is enough to put a faint smile on Thranduil’s face, but that faint smile blooms into something warmer and truer when he spies a familiar head of red hair bobbing above the sea of stockier individuals.

“I want you to dance with me,” Tauriel says, holding out a hand imperiously. And he thought _he_ was high-handed. He swirls his glass of wine thoughtfully.

“Won’t your boyfriend be annoyed?” Thranduil asks, waving a hand at the sulking lad. Tauriel shrugs.

“We broke up,” Tauriel retorts. “Yes or no?” He studies her pretty face, her tangled hair. She is nothing like his lost wife. Perhaps that is for the best.

Maybe, Thranduil thinks, it’s time to stop sitting on the sidelines.

He takes her hand.


End file.
